Whoa!
by NotAnIslander
Summary: A small series of vignettes about change. About Katniss and how she grew…


**This story was originally written for OfPearlsAndShoelaces as a Christmas fic exchange. I thought I would share it with you:**

"Whoa!"

"WHOA!"

"WHOA!"

She listens her young son shouting to the snowflakes. It's the first time he's really been old enough to experience this wonder, and hearing his reaction puts a smile on her face. He's two years old, his older sister just six and a half (that half is very important to her too). As Katniss stands back, behind the door, she allows her mind to settle into the happiness she sees. Someday's she does still remind herself that it's real, this life they've created. That it's solid and not going away. So many days Katniss has to pinch herself, not trusting that she's actually made it this far. That she and Peeta are here at all, let alone here, content, and as happy as can be expected. It wasn't always this way...

In the beginning it was quiet. But not the peaceful quiet of a winters day. It was the dreadful quiet that settles in after a catastrophe. The kind of quiet that oppresses your soul, that holds you down and settles over top. The quiet Peeta returned to. The quiet he steadfastly ignored while Katniss wallowed in it. Days turned to weeks, weeks to months, and finally, Katniss interrupted the silence with her quiet noise. She rose, she bathed, she headed out into the woods. Little by little, she woke up to the world around her. This new world she would have to live in, without Prim, without Gale, without her mother. But with Peeta. And because it was Peeta, she knew she could live again.

It was slow, with many lost days, but eventually she came back to herself. She was never the same girl, but realized with certainty, that no one was ever the same, regardless of their circumstances. Time changes us, all of us. Time may have been harsher to Katniss than to others, but change was happening all around. It took five, ten, fifteen years, but finally she embraced that change knowing there was truly was no other option...

Their daughter was born on a rainy night in April. She came into the world howling with determination. She would not be a quiet one, this was for sure. She would not be ignored. A gremlin is what Haymitch called her, much to Katniss's chagrin and Peeta's annoyance. Effervescent is what Effie would say after hitting Haymitch upside the head. Peeta thought that was much more appropriate. Katniss's terror she seemed to have felt forever changed all at once. Her need to protect overriding her fear of the future. It had been since Prim that Katniss felt this way. And somehow, even though she cried over this, she knew it was right. She knew it would be what Prim would want. And that made it perfect...

Watching Peeta with their daughter, Katniss sees a side of him she wasn't sure she had ever seen before. He was always protective of others, always trying to take care of her in ways large and small. But to see this man melt at the sight of their little one's smile, to see him agonize over their daughters little losses, this was a new side of Peeta. One she, strangely, finds very attractive.

She begins to understand what she's heard the women around town say in gossip- that nothing is more attractive than a man who loves his children. When she first heard this, she scoffed. Why wouldn't a man love his children? Her father always loved her, it was normal. But watching Peeta with their daughter? She understands what those women meant. And she finds it stirs feelings inside of her that she used to keep relegated to the bedroom.

Katniss has never been one for public displays of affection, but as time goes on, and their daughter ages, she can't keep herself from touching Peeta, standing close to Peeta, being near Peeta these days. And Peeta seems to notice, by the way he reciprocates those touches. She even loves sitting near while he bakes. It's almost as if he puts a love letter into each cheese bun for her. Later, in the privacy of their bedroom, Katniss is a different woman. Unbridled, determined. Peeta doesn't complain, doesn't question, but he does wonder what has gotten into her. It's just another way Katniss embraces the changes around her, the changes within her as well. She accepts she is a woman who needs the embrace, not just of another soul, but of a man. A specific man. Peeta. In all of her days leading up to now, she never thought she would need a man the way she needs Peeta. She depended on Gale for survival, but she needs Peeta to live...

"Momma!" her daughter calls. She finds her in the back closet of the sitting room, looking at old pictures. Pictures she thought she had hidden well. Pictures from long ago, from before.

"Look at you! Your hair. It's so pretty! You had such long hair! It's like mine! Why don't you grow it like that anymore?" Her daughter is so young. So innocent, really. So excited about everything, even pictures from the past. She has an understanding of the past, but only from the vantage point of safety in the present, only what they've begun to tell her at school.

She looks down at her young daughter, a sad smile on her face. She doesn't want to burden her daughter, who looks so much like she did. Except different. She has a happiness about her that young Katniss couldn't afford to have. Katniss hates to think that could be taken away from her. "That was a long time ago. A lifetime ago sweetie." She swallows that lump that's formed in her throat.

The photo was from their Victory Tour, she doesn't remember what District, it doesn't matter. All she can see is the terror behind the eyes of this young Katniss. All her daughter sees in the glamour and the glitz. And the hair.

It wasn't long after Peeta came back that Katniss cut her hair, for good. Her daughter doesn't know this history, or what it took to get Katniss to cut her long raven locks off into the short bob she wears today.

 _Once she finally woke up from her grief, once she looked at herself in the mirror, she knew she had to get rid of it. That just like the rose that once sat in her room, polluting it with its cloyingly sweet smell, her hair was a reminder of a time she never wanted to visit again._

 _Her sister was dead. Her mother and Gale, gone. It was time to say goodbye to that braid too. As she stared into the mirror, her hand rose, as if being guided by another force. The scissors in it opened and closed on their own. When she woke from that trance she realized she was lighter. She felt free. Free from the role she played in that war that killed her sister. Free from the idea that she was the Mockingjay. Free from the ghosts._

 _Immediately after this feeling of release came a smaller feeling of remorse. What if Peeta hates it? What if he doesn't know who I am anymore? She heads into the kitchen where she knows Peeta has stationed himself, working on pictures for their memory book._

" _Katniss, your hair!" Peeta says, looking up in surprise._

" _Do you hate it?" she asks, nervously touching it, trying to force it to grow again, perhaps._

" _No! I don't. I… I love it." He says as if in a daze. He nods his approval and she sits down. Katniss realizes that fear of change is sometimes in our own minds._

"Will you ever grow your hair like that again Momma?" her innocent one asks, blue eyes gleaming up into grey ones.

"No baby. I won't. I like my hair just like this. It's easier to go hunting this way too. Stays out of my eyes," she smiles down at her daughter, who giggles at this, then gets up to run off somewhere to play.

Katniss remains in the closet, contemplating what it must be like for her daughter, growing up the daughter of Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark. She's too young now to understand, but someday she will, and what then? How will she handle knowing what life for her mother and father was like before? And now, with more news for Peeta, Katniss thinks about the changes that are in store for them all, once again. She picks everything up and steps out of the closet just as Peeta arrives.

"Peeta! You're home!" Katniss says turning to face him, not in a panic but in a surprised way. She didn't even hear the door open, let alone his heavy tread.

"Well, yes, it's 5 o'clock, the time I usually stroll into the kitchen. What has you in such a fluster?" he asks, casually putting his arms around her.

She melts into his steady embrace. With everything that has happened today, her daughter finding the old pictures, seeing herself as she once was, and seeing herself through her daughters eyes. Finding out news she shouldn't have been surprised to have, given the way she's been behaving lately. Old feelings are bubbling to the surface. She doesn't know why she would feel this way again. She's already had one baby, why would another one bring out the old fears?

"I'm pregnant," she whispers into his neck.

"Another baby?" He asks, nervously.

She knows he is nervous, not because of Katniss's fears, but because he wants another baby so badly, but also never wanted to push Katniss beyond her comfort level.

"It's OK, Peeta," she says with a smile he feels. "You can be happy about this one too." And, just like that, she's happy as well...

He was born on a hot day in July. So hot she thought he slid out of her more than was pushed, just to find a cooler location.

He didn't cry, he didn't whimper, he just looked around as if to see what this new world was all about. And that's who he is. A child full of wonder and awe. Everything amazes him. From the way the bread rose on the counter each day, to the bugs that crawled on the forest floor. Once he learned the word "why" it was all he asked.

"That boy's a nuisance," is what Haymitch said.

"He's curious Haymitch, let him be." Is how Effie responded.

And Katniss vowed that if Haymitch wasn't nicer, he'd never see the Mellark's again.

Haymitch apologized. Sincerely too...

"Whoa!" Her young son calls out.

"WHOA!"

"WHOA!"

It seems that's all he can say. He tries to walk in the deep snow, but his little legs are no match for the drifts around him. He falls over, backwards at least, and just before Katniss can rush out to help, she sees her daughter come up behind him.

"Hey you! Stand up!" She calls and attempts to right him. However, when that doesn't work, when he still can't get up, she gives up and trounces away, thoughts of her young brother stuck on his back in the snow forgotten.

Katniss smiles. It's a wonderful world, just like Peeta has always said, just like her daughter taught her, just like her young son knows. She's pretty glad she's around to see it all.

Then she heads out to help her son on his way. It's the best she can do. It's the best anyone can do, right?


End file.
